Weekly Open Classes
CAT
Centre for Advanced Training
Are you aged 11-16 and love to dance? Then check out our Centre for Advanced Training (CAT) scheme.
Part of a family of National CAT Schemes across the country, The Lowry CAT is a part-time, pre-vocational course that gives young people access to high quality dance training. It’s ideal if you’re hoping to progress toward full-time training in the future.
The scheme will give you an important foundation in dance and allow you to reach your potential towards a sustainable and successful career in dance.
Benefits include:
- Take part in a minimum of 9 hours of training per week in contemporary and ballettechnique, pilates and creative exploration
- Supplementary sessions – such as body conditioning, nutrition and dance in context
- Intensive courses – opportunities to work with some of the best national and international companies that visit The Lowry every year
- Individual training plans (ITP) – each student will receive an ITP, which will set out the programme of training, study, work and related activities
The CAT is funded by the Music and Dance Scheme through the Department of Education, providing financial support for families through means-tested grants
CAT Taster Workshops
Each year, we offer FREE taster workshops to schools, colleges and youth groups from across the North West region as part of our outreach and recruitment programme. Our aim is to encourage more young people to consider their future in dance and to discover the potential within the training available through the CAT Scheme.
For more information about how to sign up to our free CAT taster workshops, download this handy guide here. (Opens as a PDF)
You can also download our expression of interest application form here. (Opens as a Word Document)
For more information about The Lowry Centre for Advanced Training please visit NorthWestDance.
NW Dance
NorthWestDance: The Lowry Youth Dance Partnership works closely with many different agencies and organisations around the North West and nationally to provide and champion high quality dance for young people across the region; promoting increased access to opportunities, raising standards and improving progression routes, through our varied projects and programmes.
Who are NW Dance?
We work in partnership with national organisations such as One Dance UK and the National Centre’s for Advanced Training in Dance (CATS) to deliver regional youth dance initiatives including The Lowry’s Centre for Advanced Training in Danceand U.Dance NW, the regions youth dance festival.
We work with organisations and dance companies across the UK to provide access to national projects for regional young people, such as New Adventures: ReBourne, Breakin’ Convention and English Folk Dance & Song Society.
NorthWestDance also manages Commotions Youth Dance Company, The Lowry’s Youth Dance Ambassador Scheme(alongside The Lowry Marketing Team) & the regional dance website www.northwestdance.org.uk; giving the regions dance artists and young people access to creative opportunities, progression routes and the opportunity to share their work with each other.
Check out the Sub Regional Dance Development page on the NorthWestDance website to find out who your local dance agency or organisation is. They will be able to let you know what exciting dance initiatives are available for you to get involved with in your local area!
If you’d like to get in contact with the NorthWestDance team then please do so as we would love to hear from you!
The Lowry Youth Dance Company
The Lowry’s Youth Dance Company is our in house young people’s dance company, welcoming young people ages 11-19 from across the region with a passion for dance to develop their creative and performance skills.
Across the year The Lowry Youth Dance Company members have the opportunity to work regularly with professional artists and companies, towards performances at high profile regional and national events.
Benefits Include:
- Take part in 2 hours of weekly training in technique and creative, as well as termly weekend intensives
- Supplementary sessions – such as body conditioning, nutrition and dance in context
- Intensive courses – Opportunities to work with some of the best national and international companies that visit The Lowry every year.